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How American Fire Departments are Getting People Killed
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this post was submitted on 11 Aug 2024
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That's not an accurate TL;DW. A more accurate one is: Fire department specifications in the US mean that the trucks are wildly oversized for no reason, while European and East Asian ones are smaller, more maneuverable, and safer despite serving the exact same purpose and having the exact same gear. These needlessly oversized trucks are a detriment to safe urban design because fire departments lobby local governments to keep streets ridiculously wide because their trucks can't properly drive through reasonably sized streets. The size of fire trucks could be reduced and more specialized vehicles used for EMS (which makes up the overwhelming majority of fire department responses), and it would have no impact on the readiness of fire departments at worst or, at best, it would make response times quicker.
@Rexelpitlum@discuss.tchncs.de, hopefully this suffices.
Which leads to the question of why... Why are the US (and by extension, Canadian) fire trucks such yo momma fat ass large? I never understood that.
Also, why are fire truck always first responders to incidents that require an ambulance instead? It s like sending a fire truck to a bank robbery. Thanks, cool, but you're the wrong department here.
Then while talking about ambulances too... Why are usi ambulances also such oversized monster trucks? Again, look at European ambulances which are awesome and small.
EMR here so I have some insight on this.
As far as why firetrucks respond to medical emergencies, it's because they're also trained EMRs (previously called first responders) so they can provide some treatment on the scene even if they can't provide transport or do all the things an EMT or paramedic can do. In many emergency situations fire crews are also able to act where medical responders couldn't. In a car accident they can cut up the car so the patient can be removed without disturbing a potentially broken spine. In confined spaces they have SCBA gear to enter safely where normal medical responders can't do anything. Hell, if you wanted to, you could extract a patient through a second story wall with the equipment firefighters have at their disposal. There are many times where firefighters have resources that the ambulance crew don't have access to. Firetrucks, due to the fact that they are built like tanks, are also used for trafic control. If a road needs to be shut down they just park a fire truck across it. If there's an accident along a busy road they can park the fire truck between the responders and traffic so any lookielou hits the fire truck instead of the ambulance crew which is a frequent enough occurance that it is specifically covered in training. There is no better friend to EMS than a firetruck on scene.
As far as why ambulances are so huge, it's partly because they are mobile emergency rooms. They have everything you could possibly want to stabilize a patient in them plus spares and enough room to work around that patient while on the move. The other reason they're so big is because they're designed to be hit. While they aren't as indestructable as a fire truck, they are designed to come out as the winner in most car accidents because the likelihood of them being in a collision is much higher than most vehicles and they frequently carry unsecured people in the back. Ambulance accidents are also something we were specifically trained for. If it does happen then the ambulance may not always be able to take a hit and keep moving like a firetruck could, but it will almost always keep those in the back alive if not entirely unharmed.
Sorry for any spelling mistakes, that was more of a wall of text than I planned and I just woke up so my brain isn't working yet.
Former FF, and current EMT here.
Just to add a few things, Fire Departments are also increasingly running paramedics or EMTs to be able to do more care before the ambulance shows up. It's not uncommon for the FD to beat my ambulance to a scene.
They are also great lifters and pusher pushers. One of my favorite lines is "lift with your firefighters, not your back." I can't tell you how many times their muscle has been helpful on a scene. But, they still have to respond to fires, and their understaffed, so they cant bring their SUV to my medical.
And as for pushers. Running a code, my medic will be pushing drugs, I'll be breathing for the patient, I'll have a fire fighter pushing on the patients chest, and another ff driving the rig. Three people is super obnoxious in the back of a vanbulance... it still gets tight in the back of my box that is on an f450 chasis, but way better than it could be.